SENTENCING STATEMENTS
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HMA v Patrick Scott Moohan
Oct 30, 2025
On sentencing, Lord Arthurson made the following comments:
“Patrick Scott Moohan, you have this morning pled guilty to a section 76 indictment, which indictment libels a single charge of assault to severe injury and attempted murder using a knife, all while you were on a bail order.
You are currently aged 48. You have to date accrued a formidable criminal history of previous convictions. You have 52 groups of convictions on your record, 11 of these being at indictment level. You have served to date 34 custodial sentences. In 1994 you were convicted at the High Court for assault and robbery. In the sheriff court you were convicted in 2002 on two charges of assault and robbery while on bail. In 2010 you were convicted of assault to severe injury and permanent disfigurement, using a knife. In 2016 you were convicted of assault to severe injury.
On 14 April 2025 at London Road, Edinburgh, at some time after 5am, in a public street you used a knife to assault your victim to his severe injury, and you have accepted by your plea today that in so doing you attempted to murder him. The agreed narrative has just been read into the record. I do not propose to rehearse that material. Suffice to say, you have once again engaged in indictment level violence, on this occasion, to be precise, severe instrumental violence, escalated in the circumstances of this case to the crime of attempted murder. The narrative records that you produced a knife and a hammer during the confrontation with your victim. The knife had a single serrated cutting edge and a pointed tip. You inflicted a penetrating 3.5cm wide wound to the complainer’s left anterior chest wall, occasioning a large volume haemothorax and a small volume left pneumothorax. Your victim collapsed and was taken to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary by ambulance, having suffered considerable blood loss. He required explorative surgery and the insertion of a chest drain.
I have listened with care to the submissions advanced in mitigation on your behalf this morning by your counsel, and note in particular what has been said regarding the background to your possession of the weapons you had with you, the timing and utility of your early plea of guilty, your challenging upbringing, your present family circumstances, your history of drug misuse, your mental health issues and your expressed remorse.
In the whole circumstances, which circumstances encompass the gravity of the offence before the court this morning, your extensive history of offending on indictment, in particular for crimes of violence, and the features of mitigation already referred to, it is plain that only a substantial custodial disposal is appropriate. You will accordingly serve on this indictment a sentence of 9 years imprisonment, discounted from a headline period of 12 years and 6 months due to the timing of your plea of guilty. I attribute 6 months of that headline period to the bail aggravation libelled in the charge.
This sentence will be backdated to the date of your initial remand into custody in these proceedings, namely to 15 April 2025.”
30 October 2025